Filming the truth about addiction

Sam Tarplin and Nate Robertson, two recovering drug users are trying to pin down why the talk of so many high school reunions is about which football player, hockey star or softball player is using, in jail — or dead.

Inside the folder are the release forms for the drug addicts and police officers, lawyers and mental health professionals Tarplin and Robertson are interviewing for their documentary on the opiate epidemic on Cape Cod, "What Happened Here: The Untold Story of Addiction on Cape Cod."

The two recovering drug users are trying to pin down why the talk of so many high school reunions is about which football player, hockey star or softball player is using, in jail — or dead.

The documentary focuses on Falmouth, where Tarplin grew up and attended high school.

But interview subjects are from across the peninsula, Tarplin and Robertson said.

"I used and got clean in Falmouth," Tarplin said. But "it's the whole Cape."

The opioid epidemic has long tentacles, Robertson said. "It's not isolated to the Cape."

According to the most recent drug overdose death figures released by the state Department of Public Health, 642 people in Massachusetts died of opioid poisoning deaths in 2011.

Trends show users are younger and more affluent than in the past, according to a statement from the Yarmouth Police Department.

Yarmouth police said the number of heroin users in the United States has grown by almost 80 percent in the past five years while the number of heroin-related deaths is up 55 percent over the past 12 years.

Narrowing the focus to a resort community within easy driving distance of New Bedford and Barnstable helps anchor the documentary in time and place — and provides a framework in which the two fledgling documentarians can encourage people to seek treatment.

"I want to get a dialogue going between the public and people in recovery," Tarplin said. "Also, I want to show there are treatments for this."

A lot of public attention has focused on the crimes associated with drug use and tragedies among those both local and celebrated — most recently the death of actor Philip Seymour Hoffman through an apparent heroin overdose, Robertson said.

"There is a fledgling awareness of recovery. I think it can be fleshed out more," he said.

For both men, the issue is personal.

Tarplin started using opiates in high school, when a friend gave him a "little blue 30-milligram Percocet" to take for fun.

"I thought, 'I want to do more of that every day,'" Tarplin said.

He moved on to OxyContin, which was easier to obtain seven or eight years ago. "I was a good student until I started using," Tarplin said.

After barely graduating from Falmouth High School in 2007, Tarplin said he moved to Israel and joined the army where he couldn't locate opiates but did see action on the Gaza line, West Bank and Egyptian border.

"I came back with some PTSD from that," Tarplin said.

"I'm happy I did it. It was a hell of an experience," Tarplin said. But he didn't get the geographic cure, using alcohol and marijuana instead of opiates to get high.

"In reality I drank pretty alcoholically in the army," Tarplin said. "When I came back all my pill dealers were now heroin dealers. I started getting high again" by sniffing heroin.

He moved to Boston but found himself wandering Dorchester and Harvard Square, looking for the "sketchiest guy" available, whom he presumed would be a drug dealer.

"I'm lucky I didn't get hurt. I did get robbed a couple times," Tarplin said.

He returned to the Cape in October of 2011 and started using needles, he said. His life quickly went downhill. Within a few months, he was committing felonies such as petty burglary, Tarplin said.

He sold anything of value — computer, guitar, camera — to buy more heroin.

When he ended up at Falmouth Hospital one day in early 2012, a physician suggested he seek help from Gosnold on Cape Cod, the largest addiction treatment organization on the Cape.

"The craziness that came out of my mouth was, 'I'm not an addict,'" Tarplin said.

His parents suggested he give it a try one night. Tarplin agreed and ended up going through detox and a recovery house. He got clean, relapsed — and has been drug-free for seven months now.

Tarplin said he wants people to realize that drug addiction isn't just for people from troubled families.

He said he has "exceptional parents" who instilled good values.

Robertson, who grew up in East Greenwich, R.I., said his parents were going through a divorce when he became a "serious cocaine and crack addict" and segued into heroin use.

But his drug use started in college with "party" hallucinogens such as Ecstasy and LSD.

"I came to a point where I overdosed on my way to work, woke up in an ambulance," Robertson said. "I really didn't think drugs were a problem. I didn't realize how sick I had gotten even when EMTs saved my life" by treating him with Narcan — an anti-overdose inhalant — in his car, he said.

Robertson said a family member had gone through alcohol recovery at Gosnold, and he guided him through the recovery process.

He said he's been clean about a year and a half.

"In the past 10 to 20 years, treatments have evolved so much," Robertson said. Fifty years ago people "just yelled at you," now there are drug replacement therapies and comfort medications to help take some of the pain out of the recovery process, not to mention therapy, support groups and 12-step programs, Tarplin said.

But, Robertson said, "At some point you have to white knuckle it."

"That's the tough part for an addict," Tarplin said. "Some people need to be inpatient" to make it through the process.

One of the goals of the documentary is to get users to think, "Maybe I should get into treatment as soon as possible," Tarplin said.

Falmouth Jewish Congregation Rabbi Elias Lieberman, a supporter of the film project, said Tarplin grew up in his congregation, but he only recently became aware of his journey through addiction to recovery.

"I'm just filled with admiration for the struggle he's been waging," Lieberman said. He said he's also impressed Tarplin wanting to use his experience to help other people.

"Without question it's a community issue."

There's still a lot of ignorance about the nature of opiate addiction, and "there's not a good awareness of the resources that we have" to combat it, Lieberman said.

By the end of last week Tarplin had completed about eight hours of raw filming for what he expects to be a 90- to 120-minute full-length documentary.

Tuesday he was at the Statehouse in Boston filming state Rep. Randy Hunt, R-Sandwich, testifying about the benefits of treatment over prison for nonviolent drug offenders.

Tarplin and Robertson, who is doing research and lining up interviews for the documentary, have raised $1,045 for the project through a crowdsource site called Indiegogo.

Tarplin said he has a total of $3,500 in spec funds and hopes to get up to $4,000 extra in grants or other donations. Zach Gallagher, a former college roommate, is writing the script.

"We also need a plot now," Tarplin said.

They expect to finish filming in May and have the documentary finished by October. Tarplin said they hope to have local screenings and would like to get the documentary shown at regional film festivals.

They also want to show people what happens when they start using drugs.

"In the end, the party is just shooting up in your mother's bathroom."